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Episode 23. All In, All Out · The Vincere Project

• Vince: Man, it's the Vincere project keeps going. It just keeps going and going and going. As long as Vince is around, it seems like it's gonna happen. But I I don't know. I think I think Aunt Jamie's kinda kind of helping build some momentum. Man, all the ideas, all the stuff about to go into the fall. Got some plans. We failed a few things with the podcast. We nailed it with a few other things. Businesses are all cooking, but the topics are evolving naturally, right? I had this laundry list of items and topics and I'm like, I want to get to all of them, like one episode and you know, have good advisors around me and people that slow me down. Cause I can go all in and I can be very intense and obsessive. Very, very obsessive. I mean it's the gift and the curse. Like I like don't go halfway with anything. War, addiction, sports, love, relationships, good things, bad things. you know, over the top. And, you know, I work through that to this day, right? at times it's favored me and been very helpful in terms of pursuing and challenging and making things more difficult than they need to be. It's funny, I'm looking over my notes and I always have this moment like before I teach a graduate class, I lay out like my like I have a educational journal. It's like just like this document if you're you can see the YouTube, you saw what it is. It's a fifty cent notebook. But it's just notes from across the semesters and You know, one thing I I picked out, I I noted a a few years ago, is it's better to be all in or all out. You don't want to get caught in in between and in in that sense it was applied to the idea of becoming a professional counselor and doing that kind of work. because if we reverse back from an all in commitment where it's a lifestyle and identity part of our obsession, we get really good at that particular thing, whether it's it's it's it's it's pro in in in favor of us or is it maladaptive and can be negative and have consequences that are you know impactful beyond what they need to be. And some things are slow drip, right? They start with really, really minor, small decisions. And naturally as humans we can wander into much more difficult situations. And you know, w the people that are very analytical would say like, they didn't do any risk mitigation. They didn't, you know, take inventory of this, this, and this or think about that, that, that. And I would agree with those folks that And I think, you know, when it comes to risk, probability, and the management of those things, my best experience was post-military in playing poker for two years. And that's exclusively what I did. I played cash poker, I played tournament poker. this is post-drug addiction overdose, but I was obsessed, right? And I mean studied, watched videos, played a lot, a lot of online, played a live poker, and I still needed the instability of the dopamine hit. was addicted to chasing that, but I had enough, you I was in a spa where I had enough of a bankroll to sustain the life that I was sustaining. And it wasn't good or flush or anything like that, but it was like, I'm not homeless right now. That's a heck of a lot better. I'm not strung out on drugs. I'm eating food again, and I'm rekindling my life. It's kind of trying to pick a cardinal direction of like what do I want to have happen in that window of time? And man, what a journey, right? It's like talk about picking yourself up off the ground, like it was like build building a life out and it was very uncertain and unclear and You know, there was no there was no sort of income, there was no VA, there was no pension or anything. I like, all right, like this is my bankroll, this is my nut, like I have to protect this. And I learned about capital and return on capital and how to make it work and keep it moving and and risk and and mitigation and and all the probabilities. So like I made a few notes, you know, in that time and I I'm looking down at them right now, so it's fresh on my mind. It's like, you know, and this is very general, it sounds like common sense, but when you apply the logic in application of how you're gonna make a living, there is an a a behavioral and emotional and intellectual component to this. So by the time I was doing this, right, like I I would I had a life, right? My life was like, hey, I I would see my family on occasion. I was rekindling those relationships. And but I was very regimented and disciplined in the sense of how I manage my bankroll and my time. So I would get up at like three or four in the afternoon, right? I'd go for a run or a workout or whatever it was Like I would do some sort of physical activity, I would eat, maybe, maybe not. At that point I was still smoking it or chewing. It just depended on what was going on. Nicotine was part my life. And and that would overcaffeinate and start the day, right? So in terms of behavior, like I hadn't really changed from the army, right? I was kinda like that's like that was the extent of what my morning ritual was. And it's not much different now, but it's probably a little softer in terms of the impact. So so all that that would start the day, and then I would go and I would play poker for hours on end, either online, right, and have a ritual or practice where I'd play for four hours and take a break and play another four, take a break to play another four, and go to bed at four or five in the morning, six in the morning, seven, eight, nine, depending on what's that was going on at the tables, or I'd go down Atlantic City, I'd go up to Connecticut to Foxwoods or up to parks in Pennsylvania, Harris and Philly sometimes. And it was just my lifestyle. It was just roam around and that that was built into life. The commute, the expense of all of it, staying where you're gonna stay and and rounding and working the tables and playing. Now it's not as dramatic as like you would think that movie rounders or anything that, but there is a semblance to it, right? You fall into an underworld that is very, very unique and distinct, right? It's like it's the subculture which in the within the framework of that poker room just because you're frequently there enough that you become part of the characters in there. And sometimes, depending on the place, here's a backdrop, that bar could look like the, you know, the the the scene. The scene in Star Wars. So we're not quite in Kensington or Soder City in Iraq at that point, where like the the the mongoloids are everywhere. But at this point, these people are like some semblance of holding it together, but not really, right? And you're you're still one foot in, one foot out of the underworld in in some cases. But in a softer sense, right? If you're disciplined about it, right? You're not exposed to to illicit or legal activity, at least not directly. So playing poker brings in all sorts of characters, right? And you can have At a table, it could be somebody that's a corporate executive, it could be a banker, it could be another rounder, it could be a soccer mom, it could be somebody doing a bachelor party, it could be somebody just a degenerate gambler taking a break from the pits, right? And in or it could be a card dealer, it could be a card shark, it could be a mobster, a gangster, a drug dealer, any of their spouses or friends, it could be a contractor. Poker's a universal game like that. Gambling in general grows across many cultures, right? The games of chance, betting on sports, right, and things of that nature. That's in our DNA and genetics. So but the part of it for me though is the big part is the application, is what I found for myself and other people, the curve, and why I was able to do it is what people do correctly or not correctly, right? What people do correctly is they play more of a tight aggressive style, right? Meaning they narrow down the focus to a set of prescribed cards that they'll play, given certain situations and conditions to do so. So the beginning it's very polarizing and there's a dichotomy. Yes, I'm in, no, I'm out. And a lot of times when we're learning something, that is the best starting point. Counseling, firing a weapon, how to become an athlete, learning a language, they all start like that. There has to be a degree of commitment because you are exposed to risk beyond interest at that point. Because now when you talk about the game of poker, when it's played for real cash, and you're talking about people that are making a living doing this in some way, shape or form, nobody gives their money away for free. And everybody needs action. So to get action, you have to give action. but you can do that in a smart sense. I think this applies to business and very much investing in many ways, shapes, and and forms. Risk management in the military, there's a couple extra layers to that, and it's a little bit more kind of complex, but complicated than simply playing a poker game, if that makes sense. But when it comes to capital and being all in or not. That is the lens and filter that I look at. So then when you're making a decision of what to play, once you commit to playing, you can think about it in a general sense. If you have 100% of the hands you play, 80% of them are not hands to play, 20% of them are good hands to play, 20% of that 20%, right? As a hundred percent, meaning there's like two to four hands, maybe up to forty percent, if you want to extend that up a little bit if you're a really aggressive player. So out of a hundred hands, you're not playing. very many hands if you want to be successful from my philosophy, right? And then you flip it around, what happens is people take these marginal cards if they don't know what they're doing. And that is essentially what the professional's looking for, right? It doesn't mean that that person can't win because there's random chance involved until all the last cards are out, right? the flop, the turn, and the river, right? Because the th statistical probability is not shift every step of the way. And and it there's a lot of different things that can happen. Right. so you want to give control to that on the front end is like, hey, I'm either in or I'm out, right? much like investing or things we commit to beyond the scope of measuring risk and probability. The second part would be people ignore position and how the action is being driven. And in this part we're talking about pot control, right? So the better my hand, the later I am going to choose to either bet, call, or fold. if I have aces, I want that hand to get ballooned up to the maximum amount possible. And then I may want to jam in on that before any money or any other action comes out. because I have the highest statistical probability or favor. Alternatively, though, if you're playing at a more advanced level in skill set game, you might want to identify one or two people that may have some semblance of a hand to start to rule out or confirm or deny exactly what cards they're playing with or not. The action will tell and drive what that is, but your position matters a lot in terms of the tactics and strategies you're gonna use. I think that's a good rule for life. The chessboard would tell you that over and over again. And the chessboard for life, it absolutely reinforces that there's consequences for all of it. the actions and the inactions. The the third part is people call too much, right? They just call, right? They just accept what it is, right? And I think good rule good rule for life in terms of engaging in relationships and businesses, investments, time, cognition perception, and attention. we don't want to just be calling or passively playing along with those things. You know, we want to better fold, right? Increase the intensity, get more of that, be greedy for the joyful things that we're learning, right? Where we're being challenged, we're gaining something from that in the real time in our life, right? And sometimes that doesn't mean that we're not paying attention to the problems or the weaknesses or maybe deficiencies that we're trying to address. But let's not rule out and like cut out all the joy in our life as we rewire or prescribe what an all-in or fundamental life change looks like. Think that's really important. And in terms of poker, right, this is essentially, I mean, look, to call, right, is to put you yourself into some really, really bad positions and to play passive. I think that that you're ultimately not seizing control, seizing control, I'm sorry, of the moments and times when you have statistical probabilities in your favor to do so, right? Because they don't come often, right? And I think what happens is. When you're presented those opportunities and you know that they're in front of you, you have to seize them and go all in until presented evidence that you're not all in. Because you could start with aces in the beginning, right? By the time the flop turned the river, there may be a whole nother story that's been told here. And those aces are no longer the best hand, right? Sometimes the courageous thing is to get bluffed off a hand or to fold or to walk away, right? Because we want to protect the capital to play another day. man, so many decisions to make in that particular moment in time. So I think that's kind of part of it, where we can get caught in that is specifically in day trading or in other cases where people swing trade. I think people can get addicted to that obsession. That drives much of the action. People start playing suited cards, they're slightly out of position, they're locking in on one particular player trying to siege their capital, assets, or money, right? That's a more advanced skill set or or tool or tactic as opposed to to playing the whole the whole board. But it's an aggressive way to play and it does work. The the more money that cuts have available on that table, right? You're talking about 2-5, 510, 1020, and above, there's mortgage payments plus per hand that are exchanged on those tables. I would say at that point in time, my experience, there is definitely a heightened sense of awareness when that level of play is in there, just because the level of money that's out there. Whether somebody cares or not or they're a professional poker player or not, they're typically cognizant and typically have. High social awareness, right? So they're measuring, assessing, evaluating at least the action that's happening. They might not have be zeroing in on the personality traits, characteristics, or the any sort of microaggressions that are that are taking place. Because they could just keep reloading five grand, five grand, five grand, five grand, five grand. You can really never beat a person like that because they can just make wild, wild bets to shift the demographics or dynamics of how the game plays. That is not necessarily where you need to start where you're learning about yourself or what you're going to commit all into or not. But I kind of veered off of what I'm trying to express and explain. In that moment in time, you can always do fall back to what you know is a basic tactic is like, hey, my two options are to bet and or to fold. Right? I either want to drive the action, right, and raise, right? Or I want to fold. If I don't think my hand is good enough to do to bet or to to raise, then I have no re reason to be in that particular hand, playing that, right? It's like going into business where you don't have a competitive advantage. I have a whole series of stories I could share about people that have wandered into business. agreements or arrangements where that they thought because they had success in another domain that it was guaranteed or automatic they were gonna have success in a different domain. and in some cases people are successful, yet I would say that there are different industries for different reasons. And if you're not comfortable, familiar or have any sort of competence in an industry, it's a responsibly learn about that particular thing that you're obsessing about, looking at, or considering going on all in without a doubt. All the consequences matter because you're taking the maximum responsibility with the particular thing. and then the last part, people overvalue their hands. It's like holding on to a bad stock and having bias, right? It's like, hey, I I have this this hand that was good and now it's bad and I know I need to fold it, but I'm gonna ride it in because my pride tells me I can't do that. And I think in poker it for me, in in a a beautiful kind of way, I literally started to heal in that sense. I never really got too tied to my emotions. And once I got into a groove and it it was really I mean, it was just I was just winning a lot and It was almost like a a Zen like thing where like some nights I would just be so patient and maybe the day would be a net loss, right? And just between fuel, the hotel, table action, tips, stuff like that. But then by doing that, you sometimes would fall into patterns where you'd go like four or five days where you just never get those hands that would be super flush and like the perfect opportunities and then boom, you hit like another stretch where you just can't miss. My experience now investing in the stock market has been very much the same in this last decade. It's like you you know which hands are kind of gonna be the slow drip hands that are gonna keep you in the game. You know the ones that have the potential to balloon and be 10x, 20x, and in the stock market, you can go to 100x, right? So that's that's a a beautiful part of the actual markets and the free market economy and how it helps people, right? But it the the part about it that's really important is the three things I think is the behavioral part and the emotional management part of it. Right. And in in that storyline, I think I apply that to counseling immediately with clients. And I think that's what p folks enjoy working with Dr. Vince and and his team, right? The few handful of people that I work closely with on a regular basis would identify these things. But the three things that are gonna hurt somebody in any case, right, whatever they go all in it, whether they're playing poker, business, life, marriage, parenting, travel, phase of life, career changes, promotions, demotions. Civil litigation, criminal litigation, whatever it might be, is going on to some version of tilt where you're chasing something. That poor emotional management has j I mean it can just destroy everything, right? Because you're not preserving anything at that point. It's the it's it's idiotic like somebody saying, Burn the boats, that's what you need to do. That's idiotic, right? You might want to burn some of the boats and nobody else can use it, but those long timbers or any sort of metal or resources or ropes, you're keeping them or fabric. You might destroy the structure of the thing, but you're gonna keep the parts of the thing. So like I think some people get over carried away with that kind of stuff. I don't know. I'm just like that's the sensitivity up to words, right? But that can create that emotional thing, like you gotta burn the boats if you're gonna go all in. Like I don't know about that. I think you can do some risk mitigation and probabilities and overcome the uncertainty in your gut. And when you're playing with your mortgage, right, that changes the dynamic of the table. It's scared money, right? And you have to play differently. and predators sense that and smell that on people at poker tables. That's my experience, right? So failing to adapt. Now in the military they talk about that, but failure to adapt, I would say in life in general, right? We get presented new evidence that the world is changing and there's a way it's going to be different or better, right? the privatization of security, right? The the surveillance state, us being recording, me being on the recording on this podcast are all digital footprints. the technicality and expertise of the people applying the digital footprint. Is more advanced. We had we had an issue at the house, we had to get looked at. The dude comes in with his phone right out of his pocket, pulls it out, walks around the house, measures the whole house, hits a button, prints out a full report, like, hey, here's the dimensions we have to take a look at, something, whatever, to fix, do this, update, whatever. Just like that. you took less than like ten minutes. Measure the whole house. The the material, everything just populated, that's where we're at. World looks very different, you know, and I think like there's one more step he takes to price it out, to figure out that that that matrix, right? And they got that down to the penny. So yeah, the world's better than it's ever been and if you want to key be part of it. But I think failing to adapt is where people get stuck and it's a generational thing at times. I think that's for me selfishly at this phase, as opposed to spending my time these days in a poker room where I easily could wander myself into. It's more of a once in a while thing these days. I prefer to be in the classroom, right? That that's just a better place for me because the the risk and probabilities and the potential for obsession is limited to, you know, the controls that I set on the thing. And then the last part is giving away too much information, right? So people would ask me, like, hey, Vince, like you're always giving away and talking to sure. Like, yeah, I'm trying to give it all away. But like, doesn't mean that I'm a fool to place things that I care about in jeopardy or risk, right? I think you know, I'm giving away just ideas or thoughts from processing my experiences where I learned a bunch of different things. You know, playing too loose isn't good. Ignoring position doesn't help, right? Calling too much is never good for anybody. You want to bet, bet, bet, bet big, right? And that bet needs to be infrequent, but Big and aggressive when you're all in on especially when you know you have a competitive advantage. You're a fool to not. You're 100% a fool. And you're only gonna get a handful as in your lifetime. Some people I do think get a little more lucky than others because they're on the hunt for them. But let's say in your lifespan from the time you're 15 to the to 75, right? You may get 20 opportunities, right? To siege those moments where your gut's telling you to do something or do something different, increase the intensity or step away from something. And in those critical mass moments, it's an all-in endeavor, all in, all out. Right. And it's much like poker in in my experience. But giving away too much information, yeah, all of it. Because I could go on and on and do a three-hour class on doing the odds of particular situations and circumstances and how to play certain cards and the numbers of cards in certain situations. The point wasn't a poker reflection. It was more just about life and some of the action logics that I applied to. Whether I do things or I don't think do things, right? Some hands you go long on, but then you know, they they were aces and then the statistical probability nods dip the other way. And you fold and move on. there'll be another hand that comes through that'll be aces. If you're patient enough, you just wait. Statistical probabilities favor all of us. It's up to us to to be able to read our genetic code to know where we need to be all in or not. Cool. Man, four and a half minutes longer than I wanted to be. We're gonna keep going. It's all good. Summer's over. This is it, back in the fall. Enjoy.